What is bharatnet and how to give facilities

 BharatNet scheme; creating a connectivity highway for all Gram Panchayats of India

The government of India has taken great strides to create a highway of connectivity for the villages and remote areas of the nation. To spearhead the motion, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is implementing the BharatNet project for providing the last mile connectivity to all Gram Panchayats (GPs) of the country. 

In reply to a question in Lok Sabha, MoS for Electronics & Information Technology, Rajeev Chandrasekhar said that as a part of the BharatNet project, CSC e-Governance Services India Limited -a Special Purpose Vehicle (CSC-SPV) had been assigned to provide the last mile connectivity, through 1Wi-Fi Access Point and 5 FTTH in about 77,115 GPs.

Till now, 85717 Wi-Fi Access Points and 126301 FTTH connections have been installed in these GPs.

What is BharatNet?

To realise the vision of Digital India, BharatNet aims to establish a highly scalable network infrastructure accessible to provide on-demand and affordable broadband connectivity of 2 Mbps to 20 Mbps for all households and on-demand capacity to all institutions in partnership with States and the private sector.

BharatNet to light-up Indian Villages

BharatNet has the potential to transform rural India with its goal is to provide high-speed broadband connectivity to the 250,000-plus village panchayats spread across India’s 6,600 blocks and 640 districts. Its function is to act as a middle-mile network from blocks to panchayats allowing Internet service providers (ISPs), local cable operators, and other agencies to use its bandwidth and incremental fibre.

Why is Broadband Connectivity crucial for Rural India? Brad Smith in his book, Tools and Weapons: The Promise and the Peril of the Digital Age” (2019), mentions that rural broadband is the ‘the electricity of the 21st century’ and it’s accurate given the pace with which the entire world is going digital. India in tandem with the globe has fast-tacked its means to become ‘Digital India’ from cities to villages, including far-flung areas of the country.

BharatNet for Gram Panchayats will facilitate access to e-governance, telemedicine, e-education, and other digital services at the primary level of village administration. In 2017, the project expanded this project to provide last-mile connectivity by setting up Wi-Fi hotspots in villages, an initiative that is bearing results in India at this date.

BastarNet for a Digital Impact; The government had started this project for seven districts of the main tribal region of the Bastar division. The project has improved the tele-density in Chhattisgarh, which directly led to economic growth and prosperity and helped in the creation of micro-enterprises in the region.

 BharatNet project is being funded by the Universal service Obligation Fund (USOF), which was set up for improving telecom services in rural and remote areas of the country. The project is set to facilitate the delivery of e-governance, e-health, e-education, e-banking, Internet and other services to rural India.